


The Endless War

by monster



Category: Mass Effect
Genre: Action/Adventure, Angst, Destroy Ending, Explicit Language, F/F, F/M, Fluff, Gore, M/M, Paragon Commander Shepard, Post-Reaper War, Romance, Science Fiction, Sexual Content, Sexual Tension, Slow Build, Torture
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-10-25
Updated: 2013-10-26
Packaged: 2017-12-30 11:31:03
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,766
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1018096
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/monster/pseuds/monster
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The reapers are destroyed, the galaxy seems to be at rest... Commander Shepard and his crew recruit a new member for the Normandy. The new crew member is quickly tested as she has to prove her worth in the team; a new foe is after Commander Shepard.  One who won’t stop at nothing to get his revenge.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Chapter One

**CITADEL, ALLIANCE DOCKING BAY D24**

It was a rare day if Terri Dumont found herself nervous. She found herself fidgeting on the side of her crewman outfit. They sometimes felt a little too tight around her body, like some guy had really thought trough on how these outfits would look on the females. Exasperated she looked at her omni tool to see the local time. She had waited for over an hour at the docking bays, and she wasn’t really keen on waiting. Commander Shepard was supposed to meet her here, to initiate her into her new ranking into the Normandy. Normally to distract herself, she would sit down and watch the people pass by. Imagining stories for them, and watching them with honest interest. Today she was too nervous to do anything like that. Terri had heard of the stories of the amazing Commander Shepard. Hell, when she was in Los Angeles when the Reapers attacked she even caught a vid or two of him. He had taken down a Reaper _with_ a thresher maw _and_ on foot. It was such an impressive feat and at that time, it had only made her and her squad mates more powered up for the fight that was ahead of them. Seven months later, the Reapers were destroyed and the whole galaxy was rapidly trying to repair the damage done. The Reaper war seemed like a fevered dream. With help from all around the Galaxy, the Citadel was being rebuild. It had amazed her how quickly the keepers worked. Not to mention the sudden help they got from the rachni. That scared the shit out of _a lot_ of people.

Working life on the Citadel wasn’t that bad. If you were part of the team there to rebuild, you did not have a lot of sleep, the most sleep you would have in a day was up to four hours, then you were back on doing your part again. Still, it wasn’t bad, she managed to stay awake most of the day, and she was greatly motivated. Terri was mostly hurrying between two jobs,  she was in charge of some tech, this would include making new bio-scanners and VI programming. Her other job was working in Huerta Memorial Hospital in the Presidium. That was a dream come... Terri made some friends on the Citadel. A salarian, the overseer of her tech team, named Belish. Belish was friendly to her from day one, admiring her speed and handiwork on the projects he had given her. Terri and Belish worked together on most days, exchanging stories and talking about tech and how quickly they think the mass relays would be up and running again. She was pretty sure Belish was former STG, since he showed her some combat moves, but he never spoke about it and she never asked.

It didn’t take the rest of the galaxy long to rebuild the first mass relay in the Sol system, and they were making great paces to other relays. Belish was put on the Citadel to oversee most of the projects there and with the man power and the speed everyone produced, the Citadel had come along way, but it was nowhere near finished. They did their best to restore the Citadel into her old glory, architecturally wise, but every now and then, there would be a more different type of building structure between the pristine white ones. Belish let it slide mostly in his district where he oversaw the works, because then, they would watch the magic of the keepers, as those ancient aliens hurriedly worked on making it a hundred times better than it was before.

An asari walked up to Terri. “Corporal Dumont?” she questioned and Terri gave a slight nod. “I just heard from Commander Shepard, he is a tad later. There seems to be a problem at customs. He said that you should wait for him here.”

“Thank you ma’am.” Terri replied and loosened her shoulders a bit. For over an hour she had been standing in a stance fit for duty, but hearing the word that her new Commander was going to be late, she allowed herself to relax. The asari turned to leave but before she could Terri stopped her. “Ma’am, if you could tell Commander Shepard that I have taken off for a drink in Purgatory, and to meet me there.” The asari raised her eyebrow at the oddity. A lower ranking soldier wouldn’t particularly just go off into a bar, relaying a message for her Commander to see her in a bar. Terri understood how odd it must have looked, but she figured that after months of hard work and standing in military stance for so long, she deserved a break.

Terri took the rapid transit to the Purgatory bar. Purgatory bar was one of the first things to be restored by the workers on this area of the Citadel. No one minded it, not even the overseers, since they all could use the drinks and distraction it gave them. The work on the Citadel was hard and tiring, nobody could blame them for a little escapism. She waved at the human barman, who had been serving her and Belish drinks for the last four months.

“Corporal Dumont, the usual?” he asked her, she gave him a shake of her head. Her usual might knock her off her ass right now and that’s not what she wanted to show to the Commander.

“No, if you have some good old earthly orange juice, I will have it. I can’t drink now, I have a meeting with my new Commander soon.” She sat down on the bar stool and she watched the barman rumble around behind the bar, searching for the orange juice. As an afterthought she minded herself that might probably be a heavy bill, since orange juice was not going in gallons lately. The agriculture had been blossoming, but a lot of things were still hard to come by. Like steak. God, she missed steak…  He handed over the glass with the orange liquid and returned to answer her story.

“A new Commander, huh? And you are meeting that Commander here? In a bar?” his eyebrows rose as he wiped the bar clean of ryncol, by the smell of it. Terri shrugged as she took a sip from her glass. She missed orange juice, most of the drinks that she had as she worked here were water by day and alcoholic by night.

“He left me standing for a good hour. I wanted to do something to relax for a while before I took off.” She explained to him.

“You’re taking off? Who is going to order all these horrible girly drinks from now on?” He said grinning at her. Terri rolled her eyes at him and let out a small laugh.

“ _Please_ , like you don’t enjoy a little umbrella in your cocktail!” She grinned back and sipped her drink. Suddenly she found herself suddenly excited to get off the Citadel. Her mission on the ship of Commander Shepard had not been described as clearly as she would have liked to, but she had been chosen from many of the applicants.

“Well, here’s to your new adventure. Who is your new Commander, by the way?” the bartender asked her. “I would like to know the guy who is taking my favorite customer away.” Terri let out another laugh.

“Commander Shepard.” The bartender was baffled.  No word was being uttered.

“You mean your new Commander is _Commander Shepard_?” he managed to finally say. “How ever did you get that on?”

“I sent in an application and I got accepted. It was a big gamble.” She laughed again, the bartender did not say a word. Instead he was staring blankly past her head and she wondered what was so interesting. It was just her who said that her new Commander was Shepard, what was the sudden fixation on other things?

Terri turned herself around on her bar seat to follow the eyes of her bartender friend and found out that Commander Shepard himself had just walked into the doors of the Purgatory bar.

He was accompanied by a turian on his right side. On Commander Shepard’s left walked a quarian, who seemed to scan the bar with great interest. The quarian seemed to be walking a closer step next to Commander Shepard than the Turian did, who was sizing up the place. Terri directly stepped off her barstool and saluted Commander Shepard from afar. Shepard took notice and walked over to her.

“Commander Shepard.” Terri said while still holding her hand in salute. “I had gotten a message that you were late. Excuse me for meeting you here.”

“Stand down, Corporal Dumont.” Shepard told her. The Commander stuck out his hand and she shook it. “Commander John Shepard.” He told her. Terri relaxed her stance and curiously looked at the turian. The turian’s right side of his face was scarred and he had light grey colored plates, with blue markings and a visor over his left eye. She had seen turians before but never this up close and personal. The turians were mostly gathering resources for the rebuilding of the Citadel, so she rarely came in contact with them. “I got a message that I could find you here.” Shepard continued in a strict voice. Terri gathered her thoughts, thinking this must be her strike one.

“Well, I-“ she stammered but Shepard cut her off.

“I don’t think I could’ve thought of a better place to meet.” Shepard smiled a half smile at her and Terri released a large breath from her body. She was sure she was going to take a beating for meeting a higher ranking officer in a bar, on her first day. “Do you want to find a table?” Shepard asked, turning to the turian and quarian.

“Sure,” the quarian piped in. “I’ve been dying for a little relaxation.” Shepard smiled at the quarian and motioned for Terri to follow them to a table. Terri, forgetting her drink stepped back to the bar and then placed herself in the booth, next to the turian. It felt a little awkward, not even being formally introduced, and he was taking up most of the space of the booth.

“So Corporal Dumont, tell me a bit about yourself.” Shepard started as he ordered drinks from an Asari barmaid. “I’ve read your file of course but that stopped up until the Reaping Day. So I’m curious, what have you been doing?”

“Well, I was stationed on Los Angeles, part of a defense force for civilians. We held the line mostly against husks, here and then there were a couple of marauders or banshees. Worst cases we would be face to face with a brute.” Terri told him. “After you saved the galaxy, I was instantly recruited to work on the Citadel because of my medical and tech experience.”

“And what did you do on the Citadel?” a raspy voice asked. Terri had almost forgotten about that mysterious turian sitting beside her. His mandibles moved with curiosity and she collected her thoughts again.

“A lot. To say shortly.” Terri answered. “There was a lot to do, the Citadel was in ruins. We needed to work on the gravity fields, the oxygen levels and a lot of programming to make new bio-scanners, VI’s and new housings.”

“And on the medical front?” Shepard questioned.

“Well in Huerta it was mostly working night shifts, taking care of patients. I did some operations but not much, after the war ended it was just mostly burns and work injuries,” she paused for a second before continuing. “I am very capable of being a medical scientist as well. But lately it’s just been that.”

“Well we are looking for a new medical scientist, your recommendations are very appraising,” the quarian said.

“The Citadel came a long way, from how it looked before.” Shepard noted absently as he looked around the bar. “It is amazing how fast they got this place up and running again.”

“We were not completely lost, Commander Shepard,” Terri said. “Even though the damage was substantially there, it just needed to be put back to default setting. We just needed to build from what we knew, and most of it was still there. For some it was a challenge. Not for my team and our overseer.”

“I like her spirit!” The quarian told Shepard.

“We sure need spirit.” Shepard remarked.

“I should also say that the keepers are magnificent workers, and if we did not have any help from the rachni as well… Well, we would be three months behind actually.” Terri looked at Shepard, he was a hero, an icon, yet he sat there as real as the water that she washes her face with. And he just seemed human. _Normal_. It amazed her greatly. “That is also thanks to you of course, Commander.”

“Don’t mention it. I did what I thought was right, I am just glad it worked out well.” Shepard smiled briefly and at that moment the asari barmaid came with the drinks. The barmaid smiled at Shepard and Terri looked at the quarian who seemed to glare at the asari trough her helmet. Terri smiled inwardly, romance on a fleet like the Normandy never crossed her mind. It did not surprise her. She decided to take a sneak peak to the turian who was still mostly absent from the conversation. He seemed like a nice guy, she guessed.

“And your history, Corporal Dumont?” Shepard asked. “Tell me what made you join the Alliance.”

“Well, I enlisted into the Royal Marine first, sir,” she started. Shepard raised his eyebrows. “They are though sons of bitches there, they train you to be better than the rest. I got sent to Nova Scotia, it was ground training there, day and night. I started to get medical training there and they recommended me to the Alliance.”

“You were picked by them? Requested to take up uniform there?” the Commander asked, taken a swig from his drink. Terri nodded. “Impressive. Why did you enlist into the Royal Marine?”

“Different reasons. Came from a boring town, wanted to see some action.” Terri had no feelings to start telling the Commander he whole history right now. Shepard had noticed the short sentence and seemed to take the hint. He turned over to look at his turian squad mate.

“So, Garrus,” Shepard turned to the Turian who loomed over his drink to Shepard. “What is your opinion?” he turned to Terri again, “We will have you set up in the lab as our medical scientist, but we needs all hands on deck on the engineering front as well. You’ll be working closely with Garrus Vakarian.”

The turian, named Garrus shifted his weight in the booth and looked at a datapad he had in his hand. Terri noticed her old Royal Marine profile picture immediately, and hated the fact that she had cut her hair so short. It looked stupid, and she looked like a boy. The silly thing was, she had assumed that by going into the Royal Marines you had to cut your hair short. She couldn’t have been more wrong. Her first day she was bunked with the two girls, they had asked her why her hair was such a mess. Terri noticed at that point that all the other girls had kept their hair long, but kept it in a bun or a ponytail. She wanted to set herself aflame, right then and there. The girls at that point had tried to nickname her ‘Butch’ but, lucky for Terri, it did not stick when she started to grow her hair out.

“Her credentials are more than praising,” Garrus said looking at the datapad. “And she certainly seems to have the mentality to be on the Normandy.” He stopped for a second and looked at Shepard. “I don’t see why not.” His voice was something strange and new to her, it had a purr and a rasp. A slight under layer of sub-harmonics in his voice. Terri noticed the thought coming up of her finding it sexy and waved it away. The last thing she needed was a distraction like a voice throwing her off on the work floor. Besides, he’s turian, what is she thinking? “What do you say, Tali?” he questioned the quarian.

“I have already made up my mind. Also I’d welcome another female on the ship, it’s been too masculine lately.” The quarian. Garrus shot her a glance. “What else do you want me to say?” Tali questioned. “Oh yes, of course I agree with you, your _Excellency Garrus_.” She gave a sigh of annoyance, but Terri could notice by her way of teasing, the two had been doing that for a long time. Something that a brother and sister would do. The notion made Terri miss her older brother.

“That’s settled then.” Shepard said with a tone that made the discussion closed. He stuck out his hand over the table to Terri. “Welcome to the team, Corporal Dumont.” A smile hinted at his lips and Terri grabbed the hand and shook it with as much strength as she could, making sure that she was to be taken seriously. Commander Shepard didn’t really seem to notice the power she put behind the handshake but he gave her a nod of approval.

“If you don’t mind Commander, I am going to see if I can get some spare parts to store up for the Normandy.” Garrus said to Shepard.

“Of course, Garrus. We leave in two hours.” Shepard stated to the turian. The turian turned to Terri and stared her down. Terri fidgeted in her booth a bit intimidated by the turian, struggling to get out as quickly as she could. The look that Garrus had given her seemed to look like she was holding him hostage in that booth. Garrus exited the bar and Shepard gave a hearty laugh.

“Don’t worry about Vakarian,” he said turning his attention to Terri who was placing herself back in the booth. “He’s a sheep in wolves clothing, really. Just a lot of tension. I think he just needs a good – oof - hey! Ow!” Tali had punched Shepard on the arm to cut him off.

“Garrus is just worried, Shepard! Don’t talk about him like that. You’re going to give the new girl bad ideas about our loveable turian.” Tali’s voice was full of cheer and humor. Shepard could only snort at the last part.

“Hah, loveable. You never had to interrupt him when he’s doing his calibrations.” Shepard complained. Terri followed her eyes to where Garrus had just left. Thinking to herself that she might have a challenge to overcome if she was closely working with him as his new assistant. She seemed to like the quarian, couldn’t she work closer with her?

* * *

 

[ ](http://imgur.com/MhPDysU)

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I posted this story before, but only the first chapter. I decided to revise the whole story, since I was not feeling the storyline of the first. After working it out, I thought of a storyline I could really have fun with. The pairings that I have chosen here will be mostly Male Shepard/Tali’Zorah Nar Rayya and Garrus Vakarian/OC and some hints of Joker/EDI. It’s mature for now, but it might get a higher rating. I hope you enjoy the story! :)


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter Two

**CITADEL, BACHJRET WARD**

Commander Shepard told her to only bring a footlocker of stuff, but Terri had barely half a footlocker to fill on the Citadel. The only thing that she had a large quantity of was her crewman’s outfit, and that was a set of three. She had made no real efforts to get anything that represented home to her from when she left Earth. Now she wished she had. The thought of leaving was Terri terrifying at first, she did not have a lot of space flight time and she was unsure what to expect. Sure, she had been in combat and she had proved herself capable on the front lines with the Reaper War, but she had been called to take care of the dead as well, and attending her hurt squad mates. Terri looked around the room, which she shared with other female workers. There was no time for goodbyes, farewells and hope-to-see-you-soons. Commander Shepard was waiting for her outside the room with Tali and Garrus. She slung the duffel bag over her shoulder and walked to the door. It opened with a _woosh_. She saw Shepard turn from Tali, who had held his hand. Shepard let go of her hand and straightened herself. Terri smiled inwardly, they seemed like a good match together. She wondered what the uptight turian thought about it.

“Can you give me a second, Commander Shepard?” Terri asked her superior, noticing an old friend who stood close by.

“Make it quick, we need to be going soon, Corporal.” He answered her question. Terri turned to the right of the hallway and found her good friend, Belish standing there, scanning data from a terminal to his omni tool.

“Belish,” she started as the Salarian looked up to find his human friend.

“Terri, glad you came. Wanted to say goodbye.” He answered with a typical salarian voice. They talked fast, as they lived fast. “Wanted to give you this.” He turned to reach in his own duffel bag, that was slung over his shoulder.  It was rectangular box packaged in black paper.

“What is this, Sol?” Terri looked at the Belish’s gift. She wondered what could be in the package.

“A goodbye gift. Thankfulness for your work and kindness. Will miss excellent engineer worker like you. Sad to see you leave.” The salarian responded sticking out his hand for a shake. Terri took it and shook it with pride, drawing him into a hug. The salarian was dumbfounded for a second but wrapped his arm around her, giving a pat on her back. Terri smiled at the shock of the salarian.

“Thanks. I will see you soon.” She responded with kindness, she knew how Belish would react.

“Unlikely,” Belish said as if reading her mind. “But… Nice thought.” A smile hinted on his lips and Terri turned around, the package still in her hand. She stuffed it in her duffel bag, reminding herself to open it later on the Normandy, and turned towards her new Commander and squad mates.

“You were friends with a salarian?” Tali questioned her. “How did that not take twenty years of your life?”

Terri laughed in response as she looked into the quarian’s eyes behind her mask. “Belish was a good friend. He was my overseer, he kept spirits up.” Terri smiled at Tali as they made their way to the rapid transit, and took a taxi to the docking bays. When they stepped out of the rapid transit, she was stunned. It was the first time that Terri had ever seen the Normandy with her own eyes, and the sheer size of it alone amazed her. She stopped in her tracks as they had made the walk up to the entrance of the Normandy. She saw the marks that had been made on the ship from the fight. They repaired most of the ship’s hull, but every now and then, there was a scratch or a dent. The others had already followed Shepard to the decontamination room of the ship, and they turned around in curiosity when they found their new crew member not fallen in line next to them.

“First time seeing the ship?” Shepard asked Terri, who was still observing the ship, wishing she had more eyes.

“It’s just so…” she did not know what to say. “I mean, you see the vids and you get an impression but it’s nothing like this.” She fell silent again, taking a few steps forward to her new crew members.

“Well, you could just stand there or you could see the inside of it.” Shepard remarked with a smirk. Terri shook her head, still baffled by the size and beauty of the ship and walked behind the Commander for a tour of the inside.

 

**NORMANDY**

After the tour Tali had shown Terri her place to sleep. To her surprise she had gotten her own room. Granted it was on the engineering deck. Tali had told her that: “It’s a little louder than the crew quarters. Just be lucky it’s not the room that has the trash compactor.” She also overheard some rumors that the last living prothean housed there when he was under Shepard’s command.

The crew was small, she had noticed. Shepard had placed a lot of help around the colonies everywhere that had need of it. Later that day Terri had met most of the crew. She also understood from the gossip going around that Tali slept in Shepard’s quarters, but nobody seemed to deem it weird or offensive. It was more of a running gag, because they still tried to cover up their relationship. Later the Normandy was setting course to meet up with a quarian ship that was still stuck in the Sol system and needed repairs. Terri had taken the chance to roam around the ship a bit, checking to see if everything was as amazing as the rumors said it would be.  She seemed to find herself in the shuttle bay, with the Kodiak shuttles.

“You looking for something, _chica_?” a voice behind her called and she turned around to a very buff man, leaning on one side of the table of consoles. He had a huge smirk on his face and was eyeing her from head to toe. Terri was reminded by the chauvinistic assholes she dealt with in military training. They expected the females to worship the ground they walked on. He was broad, looked like he enjoyed training day and night and had several tattoo’s that she could see. Back on Earth she and her squad mates in Montreal had all taken up the same tattoo. They didn’t expect on making it out alive, so everybody was getting one. Terri missed that crew, missed the guys she lost because of the goddamn reapers. They all had something now, that bound them together, that made them stronger as a team, and something that also shows honor and respect to the fallen.

“Just touring the ship,” she replied. He shifted his weight and let his arms fall to his side. Then they went up in exclamation as he talked; “Well, you should’ve told me that sooner, I could have given you the private tour!” Terri shook her head, stifling a chuckle. “Name’s Vega, Lieutenant James Vega. I seem to detect an accent, you are not good old fashioned American born, right?” He questioned walking toward her and extending his hand. Terri shook his hand smiling.

“Terri Dumont,” she answered. “Commander Shepard already took care of the tour already, sorry to say. And you are right, I am actually from Belgium.”

“Really?” James’ eyebrows raised and he leaned back on the console again. “That’s awesome, I’m Latino. Welcome to the crew.”

“I wouldn’t have guessed,” She replied sarcastically, a smirk covering her face. “Thanks for your welcome.”

“We aren’t a big crew right now,” James told her. “Some of the crew that was with us took to going to their home planet, or they are helping on Earth or some other space station. Tali, Garrus, Joker and myself are the real die-hards, so to speak.” Terri wondered how big the crew was before she joined up.

 “You are still in contact with them, I hope?” She asked James who nodded a reply. “Well that’s good then. Hate to break up our fun conversation so soon but, I should probably go, still haven’t settled in my room.”

“You always bunked?” James asked a smile playing on his lips. Terri nodded. “I know how weird it is, suddenly having the room. I took the space up here. Just be careful that all the space in your room doesn’t make you _loco_.” He said pointing to a makeshift room out of crates. James accompanied her back to the elevator and she stepped out on the engineering deck, saying her goodbyes and walking into her room. She briefly wondered why James Vega rather slept in a makeshift room than a real one. Must be something that he took with him from serving. Like she had her deals.

Terri stared around the room, it’s was not huge, but it wasn’t small either. It had a simple two person bed, a locker for her stuff and a desk with a chair. Her duffel bag laid on the bed and she went over to pick it up, taking out her clothes, boots and as last, the present Belish had given her. Opening it she found herself staring at a couple of items. She noticed two books immediately and wondered how Belish had gotten them. Both were from Charles Darwin, the first title being _On the Origin of Species_ and the other _The Descent of Man, and Selection in Relation to Sex._ Terri couldn’t help but laugh out loud, these books were old and published many times, but she did not know that Belish would remember her story about these books. There was a knock on her door just as she was about to look at the other gifts he’d gotten her. She replied to the person who knocked to come in and was pleased to see the quarian, Tali standing in front of her.

“Hey, I was wondering if you wanted to join us for dinner?” she said. “I don’t know if you have eaten yet but-… Ooh what’s that?” she said pointing to the books in Terri’s hand. _Easily distracted,_ Terri mused to herself.

“The gifts Belish gave me, there’s more.” She replied a smile curving her lips.

“Can I see?” Tali sounded as curious as a child seeing a new toy, so Terri motioned for her to come over. “He gave you paper?” she questioned and Terri could imagine her raising an eyebrow at the question.

“Yes, well these are books with _meaning_ ,” she told her. “You see, when I was little I grew up in a very strict home. This man right here, Charles Darwin, he was an evolutionist and what he thought was for some like my family, blasphemy.”

“I see…” Tali said, but Terri got the feeling that she did not really understand.

“Charles Darwin was a scientist and he had the scientific theory that we evolved from apes.” She opened the book to flip through the pages and showed a picture of the skeletons of apes and men.

“But why is it so close to you?” Tali replied curiously observing the picture. Hastily after that she said; “If you don’t mind me asking of course.”

“When I was younger, I used to have all these crazy ideas about life and I constantly questioned my parents. They were furious about it, did not accept my curious nature. When I was older, around fourteen, I found a copy of this book, a beautiful one like this one. She did not agree with my decision to read it and she burned it.” Terri breathed out, she looked at Tali’s expression trough her mask. She saw the quarian knit her eyebrows together in frustration.

“Why would a mother do that?” Tali asked. Terri shrugged her shoulders, wanting to drop the conversation. “What else is in there?” Tali gave a slight nod to the other objects.

“Oh, let’s see…” Terri picked up a smaller package, which was wrapped and opened it, finding a glass tube, it was screwed up on top. Inside, there was soil and a little seed, it had just started growing. “Wow.” She muttered, thinking she had taken Belish for granted all these times. Could salarians fall in love with humans? Her thoughts hovered on that subject but she shook her head. She had been close with Belish, but not that close.

“It’s a plant?” Tali asked.

“Yeah, seems so.” Terri muttered in response.

“Were you-.. ehm… that salarian- you and him?” Tali managed to stutter out.

“No!” Terri replied in shock. “Gods, no! I haven’t even thought about that, or sex for that matter since I’ve been stationed on the Citadel. But, no…” she peered at the little plant again, and a slight panic hummed trough her. She did not want to come over as a xenophobe. “I mean, I like all species for that matter, but I just did not think about him like that.” Tali smiled at her, a light little laugh came from her.

“It’s quite alright, I was just checking,” Terri’s hands turned to the other package, which was a station to set the glass tube with the plant in, so she could watch it grow. She stood up placing the books and the plant plus holder on her desk, smiling. It felt like it was becoming a home.

“There’s a card.” Tali pointed out and Terri picked it up. She started reading it but was interrupted by Tali. “Read it out loud!” she told Terri.

Terri noticed that her enthusiasm was not to be hold so she did the quarian a favor. _Probably not a lot of females here to have girl time with,_ she thought to herself. Even on the Citadel, every now and then Terri and the other women there would meet up and just talk, gossip, drink wine and laugh. It was good times, just being around females off all kinds and enjoying each other’s company, even though situations were grim and dire. “Alright,” Terri started and cleared her throat. “Terri, You are a loyal friend. I always thought it was a shame you had no personal possessions. We wanted to give you this. It was nice having you on the team, this is from all of us. Until we meet again. Belish and the team.”

“Ah, it wasn’t that juicy as I expected it to be.” Tali let out a sigh.

“You expected a love confession, Tali?” Terri laughed closing the card and also placing it on her desk.

“Something, anything, simply _anything_ to get something interesting going on here!” Tali threw her hands up in frustration and Terri couldn’t help but laugh. She liked this quarian.

“Well I heard rumors about you and Shepard.” Terri pointed out, shooting her a grin. She could see the quarian feel a bit uncomfortable as she went up and scratched the side of her helmet.

“That was supposed to be a secret…” she muttered. “But I could have guessed most knew.”

“I don’t think it’s so much of a secret when I am new and the first thing I get to hear is that you sneak out to the Commanders cabin every night.” Terri laughed at her.

“Hey! I do not sneak, I scuttle!” Tali quipped back, a laugh followed after the comment.

“Tell me exactly, how _do_ quarians scuttle?”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have a few chapters in store! Feedback and comments are always welcome! I know it is a slow build story, but its really worth the wait! Trust me! Lotsa stuff gonna happen!


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